English Breakfast

I feel like calling winter into my office at 3:45 on a Friday and telling it to find another job. Church was cancelled today because of black ice. I had a suspicion last night when it started misting on the windshield. So I declared it a house pants day for all of an hour before they started bugging me and I had to find actual clothes. I can’t believe it either. So now I have decided its Cheapster Steepster Sunday. At least till it starts bugging me. Starting with this tea bag sip down. I used to really be apathetic toward EB. I used to call it beige. Not bad just never remember what I just sipped. This one has actually grown on me. It is smooth, malty, and comfortable. Sometimes that is enough.

What I heave learned about china/beijing today:

Take advantage of uber nice hotels since what’s outside the hotel is pretty gross.
And secondly….as a white foreigner in said hotel, when you ask for tea with breakfast you won’t get a choice…they will bring you English breakfast twinnings….even if they have gaiwans and three different (at least) kinds of tea on their tea bar lol

So I had this. Wheee!

Working out of a temporary/makeshift office this week…but there’s a Keurig in it. The problem is … I don’t think I’m very impressed with it. Have had two cups of Twinings EB and I’m not getting much but “hot leaf juice” flavor out of this. Something about brewing through all that paper and plastic makes me wonder how any of the real tea personality can get through.

I may have been off of Steepster for a while, but I haven’t left my teas behind! I actually had to go out and buy a second tin of this and it is almost halfway gone now because of my not so secret obsession this winter: chai!

Yes, I’ve been perfecting my own dry chai spice mix to make an easy and quick stovetop chai for the mornings to try to get myself off of coffee. I have found out that the reason I keep slipping back to coffee is because of the overall savory feel-good mouthfeel I believed is also referred to as umami.

So far I have figured out the spices that I want: cinnamon, cardamom, and ginger being the top three players with nutmeg, pepper, and occasionally clove playing a part depending on what I want for the day. And fresh farmer’s market local honey being the sweetener instead of plain ol’ white sugar.

Normally I don’t have anything against coffee, but I have discovered that when I drink it in the morning, I don’t have any types of tea at all and I am less likely to drink water throughout the day. I have a theory that this is a hold over from when I worked at McDonalds and didn’t have time to drink anything else. So, that is why I’m trying to kick the morning coffee. Besides, chai tastes a whole lot better on the cooler autumn mornings than hot coffee for some reason.

I finally was able to try out my new tea thermal! I ordered the Copco tea thermos (http://www.amazon.com/Copco-2510-4600-Tea-Thermal-Stainless/dp/B0028N6OLQ/ref=pd_sbs_k_1) which has a twistable infuser so you can stop steeping without having to dump the leaves. Unfortunately the inside of the mug is plastic, not steel…deceptive, because the outside is stainless steel!

Anyway, I decided to christen the thermal with one of my favorite teas, English Breakfast by Twinings. I heated the water and milk to boiling, put a little under 3 teaspoons of leaf in the infuser, added some Splenda and honey, and let it steep for a few minutes. The first thing I noticed was that the tea is HOT! And it refused to cool down until like an hour later…good if you’re planning on packing your tea for a long trip, but bad if you’re impatient like me :(

I’ve never made English Breakfast outside of the Zarafina, so it might have just been my weird steeping methods, but the tea did not taste very good. It actually tasted a lot like Irish Breakfast tea does…malty with notes of brown sugar and, um, sweet potato. I didn’t taste the delicious caramel-honey flavor English Breakfast with milk and honey usually gets. I don’t know if I added too much leaf, or oversteeped it, or if the temperature was off. I’m increasing the rating a little, just because before today, this tea has never let me down.

This was my caffeinated cup of the day. And it was a good cup of tea. I’m looking forward to days where I can have whatever I want. One of my first little projects will be to compare breakfast blends in one sitting. Then I’m going to compare different types of blacks in another sitting. And life will be grand. :) (and it will all be documented on Steepster.)

Hi all!!! I miss you all and wish I had time to keep up! I am currently both working and getting an MBA, so drinking tea is in myschedule, but writing about it is pushed back for later… :(

Just wanted to let you know that as soon as I am on break, I will be back!!!!!! :)

I had this tea in the hotel today while travelling, it was OK, but tasted delicious as I have gone for almost a week without tea and was in withdrawal mode! It was a bit astringent, but that may have been due to over-brewing since the tea was passed to me with the bag already in the cup! Will leave the numerical rating to a second tasting.

Have a good weekend everyone! Off to class…..

Yesterday was my birthday and I wanted to have a special cup of tea. I had a few kinds.. but nothing incredibly special. I couldn’t fully enjoy them because I was suffering from the beginning of a bad cold — sneezing, watery eyes, sore throat, cough, sniffly nose. Not fun. Today, it’s now much worse & at this point, I can’t taste much of anything.

I was craving a hearty tea with milk and sugar- comfort foods, you know- and decided on this one. Nice and full bodied, malty, smooth. The milk rounds it all out, and the sugar brings up the tea flavors, brightening the cup a bit. Just what I needed on a Monday morning.

At the bottom of the tin. I’m thinking this one might be getting stale. Instead of smooth and malty it’s more bitter and peppery. Still a decent cup. Especially when shared with a friend.